Becky: a single mum who prides herself on her independence. She knows from painful experience that men are trouble.

Louise: a loving husband, gorgeous kids. She ought to feel more grateful.

Jameela: all she’s ever done is work hard, and try her best. Why won’t life give her there one thing she really wants?

Sheila: the nest is empty, she dreams of escaping to the sun, but her husband seems so distracted.

The inhabitants of the Inventor’s Housing Estate keep themselves to themselves. There are the friendly “hellos” when commutes coincide and the odd cheeky eye roll when the wine bottles clank in number 7’s wheelie bin, but it’s not exactly Ramsay Street. The dilapidated community centre is no longer the beating heart of the estate that Becky remembers from her childhood. So the new pottery class she’s helped set up feels like a fresh start. And not just for her.

The assorted neighbours come together to try out a new skill, under the watchful eye of their charismatic teacher, Sasha. And as the soft unremarkable lumps of clay are hesitantly, lovingly moulded into delicate vases and majestic pots, so too are the lives of four women.

Concealed passions and heartaches are uncovered, relationships shattered and formed, and the possibility of transformation is revealed.

The Blurb

I have recently come back from holiday, and this holiday involved an 8-hour flight there, and another one back home. I would be on holiday for 2 1/2 weeks, and generally on holiday I tend to read in the evening rather than putting the TV on, reading a lot more than I do at home. So in preparing for this holiday I downloaded about 6 books onto my kindle. I was sat next to my 6 year old on the plane on the way there, a very excitable little girl who is into everything. So I knew I wouldn’t be able to read as much on this journey as I would do if I were sat with my 9 year old doing his own reading. I still thought I would read quite a bit of this book on the journey and need to pick up a new one shortly after arriving at our destination. I thought I would go with an easy book to start with, so picked up “Thrown” by Sara Cox.

Well, things didn’t quite work out that way, and my daughter wanted to do absolutely every activity in her plane bag within the first 20 minutes of the journey and kept chopping and changing what she was doing every few minutes, with my help of course. Changing time zones and a very busy holiday at the amazing and overwhelming Disney World parks meant that we were pretty tired most nights, and so I read far less than I thought I would. Rather than read all, or most, or even a few of the books I took with me on the kindle, I only looked at one of the books. And I actually finished reading “Thrown” a couple of days after I got home rather than shortly after arriving on holiday.

“Thrown” is about 4 women who meet and get to know each other through a brand new pottery class run at the local community centre. Each of these women has reached a sort of transition point in their lives, where they are a little stuck in one way or another, and need to find a way to move forward. They each have issues in their relationships that they need to work through. And of course in joining the pottery class they all learn a new skill.

So having said above that I thought I was going to read loads on my holiday, as this was a much more overwhelming and sensorily stimulating holiday than ones I have been on before, I did not read very much at all. In fact, “Thrown” was the only book I picked up at all. But it was exactly the right choice for this holiday. It is very much a summer holiday, easy read book. I admit that I doubt it is a book that will stay with me, like some books do. But it was a really nice book to dip into. It didn’t demand too much work from me.

The book tells the stories of these four women, each chapter told from one of their points of view, and I liked the way you dipped into Becky’s life, and then visited Jameela, then Sheila, then found out a bit about Louise’s life. One character was not centred above the others, all had their own stories explored. The story was relatively fast paced, and kept me turning the pages. Well pressing the kindle to get to the next page more accurately.

While each of the women were at a point in their lives where things were rather up in the air for them, they were rather, um, thrown if you like, the term clearly relates to the pottery class itself. This class is something of a focal point in the book as it is where the four women meet each other and form their friendships with each other. In writing the book Cox was inspired to base it around a pottery class as she was host of the show The Great Pottery Throwdown ( a programme I love) for the first couple of series; and ceramic artist Kate Malone MBE, who she worked with advised Cox on the cermic techniques discussed in the book. In fact in some ways, I felt the rather swift progress the class made going through learning the techniques in the class reminded me very much of the way the Throwdown programme showcases a different technique each week. I’ve never taken a pottery class myself so maybe you do go from making your first coil pot to pit firing your creations in a matter of weeks?

All in all, this was the perfect holiday read for me, especially on a quite full on holiday. It is an easy read, not very demanding of its audience. I don’t think it will be one of the most memorable books I’ve read. But it was enjoyable.

For what I got out of it, and what I needed from this book I would give it probably 4 out of 5 stars.